CRITIC REVIEWS
JancisRobinson.com
Tasted from a 10-cl mini sample tube. 100% Tinta de Toro from their three best terroirs (out of eight) where they work with over a hundred parcels of vines, from 70 to 120 years old, all ungrafted, dry-farmed bush vines. 18 months in French oak. Then bottle-aged for five years before release. Dark, fresh, brambly, blackcurranty nose. I like their description of 'scrub herbs' - exactly! It's a massive wine, of that there is no doubt. It has towering intensity, big (very warm) alcohol, powerfully muscular tannins and a concentration of black-olive, Bovril and sloe-berry-liqueur flavours. Cigar, cloves and Sichuan pepper stipple the hot-black-stones core of the wine. Despite the Mordor-dramatic concentration and drama, it has freshness and is undoubtably complex. Most people would want to drink this by the very small glass (TC)